12/14/14Does anyone here remember the Hare Krishna people, from the 70’s and 80’s?They were Hindus, from a branch that came to this country about fifty years ago.The actual name of the organization was the International Society of Krishna Consciousness, and 30-40 years ago you would see them in groups of five or six, in public spaces: in airports, often, or on city street corners.They wore saffron-colored robes, had shaved heads, and carried little hand-bells; and they would chant, and dance, and buttonhole passersby, and talk about their religion, and try to sell literature, or trinkets.What they were putting forward to people, through their chanting and dancing and talking, was a kind of instant, constant, high-energy bliss that was, according to them, humanity’s true natural state, and that we’re meant to live in all the time; and that anyone could access through their religion.I’m sure that’s a gross oversimplification of what they were saying – and, even more, of Hinduism in general, about which I know nothing - but that’s the general impression that came across in the twenty seconds the Hare Krishnas might have your attention as you walked by.Well, they never got any traction here, and they gradually disappeared from public view; a book about them came out in the late ‘80’s that described the internal chaos and backstabbing among them, that you can find in any human organization,that belied the perpetual rapture they claimed was theirs. This guarantee of complete happiness, and of instant, blanket solutions to all of life’s problems, is certainly not restricted to people who claim to be Hindus, or to any other single religion.There are Christian varieties.Many years ago I was working at a small theatre way over on the West Side of Manhattan; and for a few months at that time there was a Christian group that was evangelizing on street corners in the neighborhood.They were mostly high school and college kids, and they wore big buttons that said, “Get Smart – Get Saved”.One day I decided to talk with one, and hear what he had to say.(This was in the years before I came back to the church.)This young man had the simple emphatic answers that fundamentalists have, that were going to solve all my problems and make me happy, and I found what he was saying to be oversimplified and shallow.But he wanted to convert me right there on that street corner; and the longer we talked, the more time that went by and I wasn’t buying his spiel, the more agitated he got, and he finally burst into open anger.So I thanked him for his time and walked away; and he yelled after me, “God bless you!”: like he was throwing a rock at me.The anger was evidence of the disconnect between what he was saying and who he was, what he was actually living.There was truth in what we were talking about, but it was bigger than the easy solutions he was offering, that neither he nor I understood; and that’s why he was angry.All of this is particularly relevant today for a couple of reasons.The first is this: today is the third Sunday of Advent, which in our Episcopal tradition (and in several others) is known as “Gaudete Sunday”.“Gaudete” is Latin for “rejoice” (it’s actually the imperative form of the verb, so it’s a command, “Rejoice!”, and it’s taken from a verse in Paul’s letter to the Philippians: “Rejoice in the Lord always”, which for centuries has been the verse spoken at the beginning of the service on this day in the Roman mass.We did not hear that verse from Philippians today – it’s in a different lectionary cycle, we’ll hear it exactly one year from now – but we did reading from Paul’s first letter to the Thessalonians today that points in the same direction: “Rejoice always”, Paul tells us.We hear this command in the liturgy today because this is the day when, in the course of the season of Advent, we as a church turn our entire attention to the birth of Jesus Christ, and to the pure, unadulterated joy we feel at that prospect. That’s why we hear this text today.Episcopal, Lutheran, and Roman Catholic churches all observe this Sunday from that point of view.That’s why today, as you may have noticed, we light the rose-colored candle on the Advent wreath, and why priests are permitted – encouraged, on this day - to wear rose-colored vestments; the thought of which, brothers and sisters, is just a little too much for me.“Rejoice always,” we are told.This doesn’t sound like it’s limited to the coming of Christ. Does it mean the same thing the Hare Krishnas were saying?That we’re called to live always in a state of perpetual bliss?Of course not.Paul writes in the letter to the Romans, “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” So what does he mean?This brings me to the other reason why all of this is particularly relevant today: it was on this date two years ago that the murders in Sandy Hook took place.It is proper for us to recall this, not because we want to wallow in that horror, but because religion that’s worth anything looks at all of life, the way it is, not just the parts that make us feel good; and we cannot simply ignore that horrible reality on a day when our church tells us to “rejoice always.”Well, this is the Bible, we take it seriously: those words certainly mean something.What can it be?The verse in which Paul tells us to rejoice always contains two other instructions.He says, “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances.”Paul regularly, in his letters, gives specific directions as to how our behavior should reflect our new lives in Christ, and this verse is kind of a shotgun blast in that direction.And all three seem to have the same blanket character, that as Christians we should be doing each of these three things all the time.Well, of course this is impossible, isn’t it?We hear these words and we think, This is for people who are much more spiritually advanced than we are, and they must be out there somewhere, and we’re sure glad they exist, and can do the heavy lifting, while we just get on with our lives.I think we can open this up a little if we take a closer look at the second and third of these commands.Paul writes, “Be thankful in all circumstances.”He does not say, Be thankful for all circumstances.Obviously there are circumstances for which it would be insane to be thankful.But we Christians are a thankful people – we make a point of it, constantly to be thankful – because we know that what we have, we have entirely by the grace of God.Everything that’s truly good in our lives is the fruit of the Holy Spirit.So even in circumstances for which we give no thanks at all, we remain a thankful people.That’s part of our relationship to God, which does not change. When Paul tells us to “pray without ceasing”, he cannot mean that we should walk around constantly muttering the Lord’s Prayer or the General Thanksgiving or the confession of sin. In the sense that Paul is talking about here, prayer is a stance, an approach to life: a receptivity, at all times, to the presence of God: a readiness always to see it and live in it, act on it.This is Christ who is coming into our lives, who is always coming into our lives, and whom we should always be ready joyfully to welcome.That is prayer without ceasing.So when Paul tells us, “Rejoice always,”we should understand it in the same way.It’s a condition of the spirit: because Christ is always coming into our lives, we are disposed always to rejoice.Jesus told his disciples, “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”That’s the truth that we are always moving toward in this life.So the things that bother us don’t bother us as much.The things that used to defeat us no longer defeat us.And the suffering that we all feel at some time or other, in some measure or other, is put in its place: in the light of our rejoicing, always, at the coming of Christ. Thanks be to God.